On Monday, Moms Across America, Organic Consumers Association, and Beyond Pesticides announced that the District of Columbia Superior Court rejected General Mills’ motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the three nonprofits against the maker of Nature Valley granola bars. That’s a small win, but a win nonetheless.

That ruling upholds the right of non-profits to bring these types of complaints against corporations and “reinforces the notion that consumers can reasonably expect a product labeled “100% Natural” to be free of herbicides.”1 As it should.

In 2016, the three non-profit groups sued General Mills for attempting to mislead the public (I have a friend who bought those granola bars for her son for a year. She was mad.) by labeling Nature Valley granola bars as “Made with 100% NATURAL whole grain OATS” after tests revealed the presence of glyphosate.

Organic Consumers Association’s international director Ronnie Cummins said about the suit,

“This is a huge win for consumers. in making this ruling, the judge reinforced the right of consumers to have reasonable expectations about what a company means by ‘natural.’ The ‘natural’ food industry is estimated at $90 billion a year. By slapping the word ‘natural’ on products that contain pesticides and other unnatural substances, corporations deceive consumers, and cut into the market share for authentically labeled healthy and certified organic products.” 2

The Court rejected General Mills’ argument that courts should defer to the FDA on possible future ruling re: “natural” food labeling (that means the court continues to decide what is or isn’t misleading to consumers).

The Court noted it doesn’t seem likely the FDA will issue a ruling on what “natural” means anytime soon (this means many food producers seeking to avoid liability for their misrepresentations have to deal now).

The Court held that a reasonable jury could find that General Mills’ “Made With 100% Natural Whole Grain Oats” claims were misleading to consumers.(This one just seems so obvious.)

Zen Honeycutt, founder of Moms Across America, said, “When a customer chooses a food product that says 100% Natural on the packaging, they do so because the food manufacturer has communicated to them, with that claim, that their products are without harmful, man-made chemicals. We are very pleased that this case will be heard and misleading labeling will be addressed.” 4